Chapter 137: The Call of Tolvern (8)
The mountain moved.
The rocky mountain that soared in the center of Tolvern Island had lifted its head.
Simply by awakening, the island’s axis shook, and the tremors were felt even on the warships in the nearby sea.
People could only stare blankly at the surreal scene.
Those standing on the Tolbanieu coast, those on the warships near Tolvern Island, everyone.
They couldn’t believe their eyes.
Even though it was clearly happening right in front of them, their minds refused to comprehend it.
“……What’s happening right now?”
“The mountain itself…… was a golem?”
The French Hunter Management Agency, upon receiving this report, was thrown into chaos.
“A Mountain Golem? What are you talking about?!”
“Literally! They said a head sprouted from the rocky mountain and it started moving?!”
“Is that even possible?!”
In truth, the expression that a head sprouted from the mountain wasn’t entirely accurate.
The mountain was simply crouched.
One year had passed since the Contaminated Golem Seed was planted on Tolvern Island.
During that time, it had remained crouched in that spot.
It had encroached upon and taken over the original rocky mountain.
And finally, it had awakened.
As the boss of the Tolvern Island Golem Dungeon.
Everyone who witnessed this terrifying sight soon began to think the same thing.
“How…… how do we catch that……?”
Said.
Catching even a regular Metallic Golem was difficult; there was no way to respond if a mountain-sized golem started rampaging.
This time, it truly felt like Europe might be swept away.
And then.
C*ack-
It opened its mouth wide.
People saw it.
A flash of light glimmering deep within its mouth.
“……A beam?”
Fwoosh!
It spewed a beam breath through its mouth.
The destructive beam poured into a pit.
Towards the very pit where Sa-hyeok was standing.
Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa!!
Intense heat, pressure, blinding light, shockwaves.
The inside of the pit was instantly devastated.
“Gulp, cough, ugh!”
Fortunately, he wasn’t dead.
In any case, this confirmed it.
This pit wasn’t the Boss Golem’s habitat, nor was it where Ukvaron’s final weapon was stored.
This was an execution ground.
[Are you alright, Hyung-nim?]
“No, I think I’m dying. D*mn……”
Sa-hyeok was hiding behind a thick barrier.
The shield-shaped artifact Sa-hyeok possessed,
An artifact that deploys a thick barrier centered around the shield when activated.
Just before the colossal golem fired its beam, Sa-hyeok had deployed the barrier to block it.
However, this only blocked the direct hit of the beam; it couldn’t completely block the pressure and heat generated by the beam.
Still, deploying the shield was the best option.
If he had jumped out of the pit, he would have been hit by the beam sooner.
Clatter-
Sa-hyeok withdrew the deployed barrier and said,
“We need to get out of here……!”
Whoosh!
Sa-hyeok leaped into the air, towards the outside of the pit.
Whirr-
Meanwhile, the Mountain Golem charged a second beam within its mouth.
And fired again.
Fwoosh!!
Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa!!
The beam struck the pit once more.
This time, it missed.
He had escaped the pit just before the beam landed.
Whoosh!
Sa-hyeok traversed the forest, approaching the Mountain Golem.
Along the way, Sa-hyeok briefly stopped on a tree branch.
And opened his artifact case to switch equipment.
He put Kalduran’s Barrier back in and took out another weapon to equip.
[Hyung-nim, I also……!]
“Ah, right.”
Sa-hyeok took out the drone from the case and placed B*ng-ul-i on it.
The drone carrying B*ng-ul-i whirred and took off.
His current opponent was a colossal monster of a scale he had never seen before.
He needed to utilize B*ng-ul-i’s power as well.
Fastening the Shadow Sword to his waist, Sa-hyeok quickly recalled the weapons he currently had equipped.
He needed to review his equipment like this to ensure he could utilize everything without error during the actual battle.
Iron Arms of the B*ne King.
Mubuchamdo and Thunderbolt Needles.
The Ring Series.
Shadelin’s Shadow Sword.
And
‘7 weapons readily available.’
He put the rest of the weapons back in the case.
It was difficult to equip everything on his body, and it hindered his technical movements.
It would be great if he had equipment that allowed him to instantly summon weapons like an inventory, but so far, no such artifact had been discovered.
“Let’s go.”
[Yes.]
Just as he started traversing the forest again.
Fwoosh-
Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa!!
The destructive beam scorched the forest as it sped horizontally.
Hundreds of trees turned into charcoal and crumbled.
He dodged this one too.
But because of the burnt trees, his location was exposed to the golem.
“Tsk……!”
Swish!
Sa-hyeok quickly hid under another tree.
Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa!!
The destructive beam swept through the area once more.
Terrifying destructive power.
But its accuracy was terrible.
It wasn’t easy to hit Sa-hyeok, who was moving at high speed under the dense undergrowth.
‘Alright, I’m almost there……!’
At that moment.
Rumble, rumble, rumble……!
The ground began to shake once more.
The rocky mountain itself began to move as a whole.
Dust and dirt, shaken loose from its body, swept across the entire island like a thick yellow dust storm.
The Mountain Golem had begun to move in earnest.
Kooo-
It unfurled all its crouched arms.
One pair on each shoulder, a total of four arms.
Each arm was a staggering 40 meters long.
Those who saw this from outside the island turned pale.
“What…… is that……”
“Unbelievable…… How can we possibly defeat that?!”
A nightmarish scale that far exceeded common sense, enough to make them lose their will to fight just by watching.
Finally, it began to swing its arms.
Whoosh-
Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa!!
Its arms swept through the forest.
A wind pressure like a tsunami erupted, shattering and sweeping away giant trees.
“Ugh……!”
Even Sa-hyeok momentarily lost his balance due to the swirling gale.
In an instant, a section of the forest was devastated.
And because of that, Sa-hyeok’s figure was completely exposed.
The Mountain Golem didn’t miss that moment.
Fwoosh!
The beam flew towards him without a moment’s hesitation.
This time, there was no time to dodge.
Sa-hyeok took out an artifact from his pocket.
A disc-shaped artifact about 30cm in diameter,
Its function was to reflect energy-based attacks.
Of course, it was impossible to reflect the thick destructive beam entirely with a 30cm reflector.
But perhaps it would be possible to deflect it slightly, just enough to avoid a direct hit, Sa-hyeok reasoned.
And Sa-hyeok’s strategy worked.
Ting!
Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa!!
The beam was deflected.
To be precise, it was more like he shaved off just enough of the beam to avoid a direct hit.
The residual heat grazed his cheek, but he was fortunate to have escaped with just that.
But there was a loss.
“D*mn it.”
The case Sa-hyeok had left floating behind was swept away by the beam.
Of course, since he had invested everything into its durability, it wouldn’t have been destroyed, but……
‘I need to retrieve it.’
He couldn’t just abandon it without knowing where it was.
This was a battle.
It was absurd to abandon weapons in the middle of a fight.
Sa-hyeok put on his communication earphones and spoke to B*ng-ul-i.
“Find the artifact case that flew away. Tell me through the comms when you find it.”
[Understood!]
B*ng-ul-i flew in the opposite direction from where Sa-hyeok was looking.
Sa-hyeok immediately ran towards the Mountain Golem.
He was almost there.
But that meant Sa-hyeok was also within the golem’s range.
The Mountain Golem swung its arm towards Sa-hyeok without hesitation.
Its palm, over ten meters wide, slammed into the ground.
B*ng!!
Rumble!
The ground caved in, and a gust of wind erupted.
A thick cloud of dust and dirt rose as a bonus.
But this time, he wasn’t swept away by the wind.
He had been caught off guard earlier, but now he could read the flow.
He found and exploited the slightest gap between the raging wind and the impact.
A feat possible because he could read the flow of air currents with his telekinesis.
And finally-
Thud.
Sa-hyeok climbed onto the golem’s arm and immediately ascended to its shoulder.
At that moment, the golem swung another arm to knock Sa-hyeok off.
A movement like swatting a fly on its arm.
Sa-hyeok dodged the arm and simultaneously pushed the swinging arm away with his telekinesis.
Wait a minute.
‘The golem’s arm…… is being pushed back by my telekinesis?!’
Originally, it was impossible to directly apply telekinesis to golems.
Like other monsters, golems were also considered a type of living creature.
And telekinesis couldn’t be used directly on living creatures.
But as he had just witnessed, it was possible to directly interfere with this Mountain Golem using telekinesis.
This meant-
‘Could it be that this isn’t a living creature?!’
It looked like a golem and moved like a golem, but it wasn’t actually a living being.
Then what did this imply?
‘There’s someone else controlling this thing!’
The controller’s location was one of two places.
Inside its body, or outside.
Either location was plausible.
Then the best course of action was to search the closer location first.
Thump!
Sa-hyeok projected a telekinetic wave onto the golem’s body.
And began to scan its body at a molecular level.
Of course, he couldn’t scan the entire giant body at once.
Sa-hyeok climbed and crawled all over its body, continuing his scan.
The golem, upon noticing this, naturally started to rampage.
Whoosh!
Thud!
Kwa-kwa-kwa!!
It swung its four arms wildly, trying to shake Sa-hyeok off.
But only innocent trees were destroyed; Sa-hyeok remained unharmed.
He was already reading all of the golem’s movements.
Sa-hyeok continued his scan, traversing the golem’s shoulders, head, back, and sides.
If there was a controller inside, there would definitely be an empty space within.
And soon, Sa-hyeok found a suspicious area.
The center of its upper body, the area that would be the solar plexus in a human.
The density there was slightly lower compared to other areas.
‘I need to check it out.’
Sa-hyeok used his telekinesis to cling to the golem’s solar plexus.
And assumed a palm strike stance.
Kwonmu Palm Technique 3rd Form, Ripple.
Thud!!
The wave generated by the strike penetrated beyond the solar plexus.
A wave is a vibration.
Vibrations reveal their presence most prominently when they encounter an empty space.
And the golem’s solar plexus-
‘It’s empty.’
This was it.
The empty space within the golem’s body.
Probably the space where the Mountain Golem’s controller was located.
Shing!
Clang!
Sa-hyeok simultaneously drew Mubuchamdo and the Thunderbolt Needles.
The weapons with the best cutting and piercing power among those he possessed.
They began to grind away at the golem’s body surface.
Screech!
Sparks flew fiercely due to the frictional heat.
But it was all just noise and visual spectacle.
‘As expected, it can’t p*netrate properly.’
To be precise, it was penetrating, but the problem was that it was incredibly slow.
At this rate, it seemed like he would have to spend a couple of days and nights here to properly break through.
That’s how incredibly hard the golem’s body was.
Sa-hyeok quickly racked his brain.
‘Then I’ll first weaken its durability by scorching it with fire and lightning……’
[Hyung-nim! I found it!!]
At that moment, B*ng-ul-i’s voice came through the wireless earphones.
“What did you find?”
[I found the case!]
“……!”
In that instant, one of the weapons inside the case flashed through Sa-hyeok’s mind.
Yes, if it was that……!
“Where’s the case?!”
[4 o’clock direction from Hyung-nim, 75 meters away! Scan with your telekinetic detection!]
“D*mn it……!”
75 meters was outside his telekinetic range.
He couldn’t pull the case directly.
“Can’t you bring it here?!”
[With this tiny drone?! Hyung-nim, you know how heavy this case is!]
“D*mn it……!”
He had all the strategies in place, but his telekinetic range was the problem.
Wait, if the range was the problem……
“There’s a way.”
[Yes?]
Smoothly.
Sa-hyeok reached into his pocket and pulled something out.
It was
